November 23rd the VFW i bar-tend at is hosted a breakfast benefit for a dear friend of ours and a loyal member of the post. Tommy has been dealing with the effects of ALS (also known as Lugerig's disease) for over 2 years now and despite the challenges he has faced, Tommy's attitude is a shining beacon to anyone suffering from an illness outside of control.in honor of Tommy's perseverance and dedication to devoting funding to finding a cure for this atrocious illness, we hosted a breakfast that people in the community can donate to and attend on Sunday November 23rd 2014as a cook and organizer for this event i found out SO much about cooking for such a large crowd. the menu was pancakes, scrambled eggs, hash browns, sausage links and bacon. at my side i had my husband in charge of the meats and an experienced line cook in charge of the hash browns and scrambled eggs. also three cheers for VFW Post 3474s Ladies Auxiliary, they were a HUGE help with set up, serving, and spreading the word about the cause. Another group so send thanks to would be the VFW Post 3474 gentlemen themselves. POST 3474 was kind enough to donate ALL of the funds needed to buy food for Tommy's benefit. this of coarse excludes the generous donation of orange juice that came from the local market RIccardo's. Hip Hip Hooray for the goodness in all these hearts!

I am sad to say that i have close to no pictures of my own for the blog, as we didnt get a chance to leave the griddle once from when we started cooking (8:30am) to when the crowd subsided (1:30pm) but i do have some advice on how to advertise and prepare if you are planning a similar event.

first of all, breaskfast, especially on a sunday morning is a great time to hold a benifit. many folks like to go for breakfast before or after church and other then the folks you expect, you are bound to receive quite a few 'drop ins'. (especially if you live in a place like us that is prominently bars and churches). our event was arranged to run from 9am until pm, we printed out fliers, advertised in the paper, and most importantly, sold tickets.

the most vital key to selling tickets is too track the amount sold and if they are adult or children s entries. this is essential to knowing the number you need to prepare for. for this event i used the same method i used to prepare for our wedding. i set a date. in this case the Thursday before the event. on that day i totaled all of our accounted for ticket sales, facebook attendees and vocal 'yes' responses that we knew of. i took this number (200) and ADDED 100 to it. i then took this information and purchased food for 300. this came down too

to prep for this sort of event you need to get as much done the night before as you can. we defrosted the eggs (or cracked if you were using fresh) and blend with an immersion blender. precook and pan the bacon, home-fries and sausage, but not until crispy.(that is for the morning). have a couple drinks and get a good nights rest.

its important to do these things ahead of time. with three people working on an industrial size stove, there was no room or time to fit anything else in. J was mixing and cooking eggs to the left, R was crisping bacon and sausage on a make shift griddle in the middle, the hash browns and meats were staying warm in the oven, and i was on the stoves right hand griddle with the pancakes.

in other words,breakfast is a great way to hold a benefit, but make sure to have hands on people willing to go. pancakes and eggs will not hold well for longer then 30 minutes, so made to pre-order it it

All in All it was a stunning turn-out for a great guy and i would do it again in a heart beat